THOMAS BEALS was born in Chester County, Pennsylvania, in 1719. He was the son of John and Sarah Beals, formerly Sarah Bowater of an English family of Friends. Thomas Beals had two brothers, John and Bowater, and four sisters: Prudence, who married Richard Williams, Sarah, who married John Mills, Mary, who married Thomas Hunt and after his death, William Baldwin; and Phebe, who married Robert Sumner. John Beals, Junior, married Esther Hunt and Bowater Beals married Ann Cook, Sister of Isaac Cook, who was the husband of Charity Cook, a noted Friends minister.

From Chester County, as it then was, John Beals moved with his family to Monocacy Carols Manor, Maryland, There, his son Thomas, the subject of this sketch, married Sarah Ankram. From there they moved to Hopewell, near Winchester, Virginia, where John Beals died in 1745, three years before the family moved on to North Carolina.

Thomas Beals moved with his family to North Carolina in 1748, being then twenty-nine years old. He stopped first at Cane Creek, then he went to New Garden, North Carolina, which was at that time frontier territory. In a very short time he was joined by some other families. In the year 1753, Thomas Beals, then about thirty-four years of age, came forth in the ministry. The next move he made was to Westfield, Surry County, North Carolina. Here he was instrumental in the development of a large meeting. He must have lived at New Garden and Westfield about thirty years, during which time he paid lengthy visits to the Indians.

In the year 1775, twenty years before Wayne's Treaty with the Indians at Greenville, Thomas Beals, accompanied by his nephew Bowater Sumner, William Hiatt and David Ballard, started to pay a visit to the Delaware Indians and some other tribes. After passing a fort not far from Clinch Mountain in Virginia, they were arrested and carried back to the fort to be tried for their lives on the charge of being confederates of the hostile Indians. The officers, understanding that one of them was a preacher, required a sermon before they went in for trial. Thomas Beals thought it was the right time to hold a meeting with the soldiers. This proved to be a very good idea for a young man from the fort was converted and, some time after joined the Friends, became a member of the group and, at a very advanced age, bore public testimony to the truth of the principles of which he was convinced at the fort. After the meeting, the Friends were kindly entertained and told that they were at liberty to go on their journey. They crossed the Ohio River into what is now the State of Ohio; held many satisfactory meetings with the Indians and returned home safely. Discussing the trip, Thomas Beals told his friends that he saw with his spiritual eye the seed of Friends scattered all over that good land and that one day there would be a greater gathering of Friends there than any other place in the world, and that his faith was strong in the belief that he would live to see Friends settle north of the Ohio River.

In the year 1777, Thomas Beals, accompanied by William Robinson and an interpreter, Isaac Ottoman, started to pay a religious visit to the Six Nations and some other tribes of Indians and proceeded as far as Sewickley, a small meeting of Friends in the western part of Pennsylvania, where they were captured and carried to Hannelstown, not far from Fort Pitt, now Pittsburgh. There they were detained some time and then sent home. Still having a concern in his mind for the Indians, he made another attempt to visit them, but was again arrested and imprisoned, under guard, in a cold, open barn. When he was let out of confinement, he was permitted to hold a meeting with the soldiers, but was not allowed to go any farther, and had to return home.

In 1781, Thomas Beals moved from Westfield, North Carolina, to Blue Stone, Giles County, Virginia, where he lived but a few years. This move does not appear to have had the approval of his friends, for Nathan Hunt states that they sent a committee to induce him to return to Westfield, North Carolina. The little meeting of twenty or thirty families was entirely broken up at Blue Stone. Beals and his family stayed, however, and suffered not only for the necessities of life, but their son-in-law, James Horton, was taken prisoner by the Indians and, from most reliable information that can be obtained, was carried to Old Chillicothe, near Frankfort, Ohio, and there put to death.

In the year 1785, Beals moved to Lost Creek, in Tennessee, and in the year 1793, he came to Grayson County, Virginia, where Nathan Hunt states that Thomas Beals established meetings and says that he was very zealous for the support of the testimonies of Friends. In the year 1795, George Harlan and family, members of the Society of Friends, settled on the Little Miami, at Deerfield, four miles from the present town of Morrow.

In 1796, James Baldwin and Phineas Hunt, with their families, members of the Society of Friends, from Westfield, North Carolina, moved to the Virginia shore of the Ohio River. Here Mary Hunt was born, on October 18, 1796, four miles from Point Pleasant, on the Virginia shore. In February, 1797, the Baldwins and Hunts crossed the Ohio River and settled opposite Green Bottom near each other. Two families of Friends now settled together in the Northwest Territory with the one previously mentioned (the Harlans) quite remote from them.

On May 8, 1797, a group of Friends moved from Westland, Pennsylvania, and settled at High Bank on the east side of the Scioto River, four miles below the present Chillicothe. In the latter part of this same year, Jesse Baldwin moved from his first location opposite Green Bottom, some eighteen miles down the Ohio, and settled in what was called Quaker Bottom, in Lawrence County, opposite the mouth of the Guyandot River, and the present town of Guyandot. So far as can be ascertained, this was where Friends in the Northwest Territory first sat down to hold a Meeting for divine worship.

John Warner, son of Isaac and Mary Warner, who was born at High Bank, Ross County, Ohio, on July 12, 198, was, so far as is known, the first child born as a birthright member of the Society of Friends northwest of the Ohio River, and, on November 11 of that year, Rebecca Chandler, daughter of William and Hannah Chandler, was born near the same place. In 1798, a group of Friends from Hopewell, Virginia, settled at High Bank, and in the same year a group of Friends, all from North Carolina, settled at Salt Creek, near Richmondale, Ross County, Ohio.

In 1799, Thomas Beals, who had visited this country twenty-four years before, now moved to Quaker Bottom, along with other members of his family. They were accompanied by Obediah Overman and his family, all from Grayson County, Virginia. On their arrival, they opened a meeting for worship in the dwelling of Jesse Baldwin. There they met regularly during their residence at that place. The nearest Meeting to them was at Westland, Pennsylvania. Sometime during the year, 1799, Taylor Webster and family, from Redstone, Pennsylvania, settled at Grassy Prairies, five miles northeast of Chillicothe.

In the spring of 1801, Thomas Beals, Jesse Baldwin, John Beals and Daniel Beals moved from Quaker Bottom, and they, with Enoch Cox and their families, settled up Salt Creek, near the present town of Adelphia.

August 29, 1801, Thomas Beals died and was buried two days later, near Richmondale, Ross County, Ohio, in a coffin of regular shape, hollowed out of a solid white walnut tree by his ever faithful friend, Jesse Baldwin. He was assisted by Enoch Cox and others, who covered the coffin with a part of the same tree, which had previously been selected for this purpose by the deceased. Buried near him were William Puckett, Hugh Moffett, as well as others of the small community. A meeting house was later built on the land then owned by the Moffett family and a Meeting was held there for some time.

In the spring of 1802, a group of Friends settled on Lees Creek, in and near the present town of Leesburg, which is located in Highland County, Ohio, where no white person had lived before. In the fall of the same year, Sarah Beals, widow of Thomas Beals, and her sons, John and Daniel, and their families, moved from Adelphia, as did Phineas Hunt, formerly of Raccoon Falls. All settled at Lees Creek and Hardins Creek near each other. This community was augmented in the spring of 1803 by the families of Jesse Baldwin, John Beals, Bowater Beals and John Evans, and, in the fall of the same year, two Lupton families, from Hopewell, Virginia, settled at Lees Creek. On their arrival, Friends became concerned about a meeting for worship. Widow Sarah Beals heartily endorsed the idea. Thus there began a Friends Meeting at Fairfield (Leesburg), regularly authorized in May, 1804. Sarah Beals died July 7, 1813, at the age of 89, and was buried at Fairfield. Thomas Beals's daughter, Margaret, whose first husband, James Horton, was captured by the Indians, afterward married Daniel Huff, who lived in the Fairfield community.

When Thomas Beals was captured in 1775, one recalls that a young man then in the fort was converted. That young man was Beverly Milner, who eventually settled near the last residence of Sarah Beals. In his later years, after he became too feeble to attend Meeting, he often alluded to the ministry of that "heavenly man by whom he was converted." He died in 1848, when he was almost eighty-seven, and was buried at Fairfield.

This sketch may give some idea of the toil, privations, labor, struggles and sufferings of the pioneers. In planting Quakerism in the Old Northwest, Thomas Beals and his faithful wife and devoted family are but one of the hundreds who struggled, nor was he the only one buried in a log coffin. Many were buried with nothing but boards to separate them from the lone mountains, never to be seen or marked by loved ones. The author is convinced, however, that to Thomas Beals belongs the credit of having been the first Friends minister to carry the message of Christ into the vast region north and west to the Ohio, that region which in a few years, was to become the great center of the life of not only the Society of Friends, but the entire Nation. Thomas Beals's prophecy of 1775 began to be realized in his own lifetime and has long been a reality, since one-third of the Friends of America have resided within the limits of the old Northwest Territory for three-quarters of a century!

Note: On September 19, 1937, a monument was dedicated at the grave of Thomas Beals near Richmondale, Ohio.

Thomas Beals and Sarah Ancram had declared marriage intentions in Virginia, most likely at Hopewell MM, where their early books were lost in a fire in 1795. They were married in Prince Georges Co., Maryland. Living within the verge of Fairfax MM in Virginia, when that Quaker meeting was established and set off from Hopewell MM, Virginia, they were automatically transferred to Fairfax MM 1745-6. Thomas Beals remained in Prince George Co., MD until 1749. On 26 Jun 1749, Thomas and Sarah Beals and their four oldest children were granted certificates to Carvers MM, Bladen Co., NC, from there transferred to Cane Creek MM, Orange Co., NC when Cane Creek MM was set up, 7 Oct 1751 and were charter members. Then when New Garden MM (now Guilford Co., North Carolina) was set up in 1754, the family was transferred to that MM, never having moved from their original settlement. ®22

Jeremiah Mills wrote in his journal: "My grandfather died when my father was about nine years old, leaving a weakly widow in the wilderness, with a family of small children to support. I have no doubt they saw hard times. Thomas Beals and family lived near grandmother's, without seeing bread as I have often heard old people saying. They did not know what it was when my grandfather and some other persons came to see the country, and happening to have a few cakes in their saddle bags, gave some to the children, they did not know what they were, but looked at them awhile and never offered to bite them, laying them upon a board in the cabin. The girls wore leather petticoats, made of deerskins, and when they were young women grown, yet enjoyed themselves as well as Queen Victoria, dressed in silks of India and gems of Golconda. This Thomas Beals was a Quaker preacher and like Nimrod, the mighty hunter, he followed the game and was always forward in settling new countries. From Guilford, he moved into the mountains of Stokes Co., from there to Grayson Co., Virginia, from hence to the mouth of the Gian, on the Ohio River, thence to Salt Creek on the Scioto, there he was buried." ®71

In 1775, Thomas traveled into Shawnee territory with Bowater Sumner, William Hiatt and David Ballard. During their journey, they were arrested and carried back to the fort near Clinch Mt., VA to be tried for their lives on the charge of being confederates with the hostile Indians. The officers, understanding that one of them was a preacher, required a sermon before they went in for trail. Beals thought it right to hold a meeting with the soldiers, which proved to be a highly favored season. A young man (Beverly Milner) then in the fort was converted and, some time after, moved among Friends and became a member and, at a very advanced age, bore public testimony to the truth of the principles of which he was convinced at the fort. He later settled near the Beals family in Ohio and in his later years, after he became too feeble to attend Meeting, he often alluded to the ministry of that "heavenly man by whom he was converted." Beverly Milner died in 1848, when he was almost 87 and was buried at Fairfield, Ohio. He was the great-grandfather of Clyde A. Milner, later President of Guilford College in NC ®44 ®99

After this meeting was over, the Friends kindly entertained and were free and at liberty to go on their journey. They crossed the Ohio River south of Fort Duquesne (now Pittsburgh, PA) into what is now the state of Ohio and became acquainted with Chief Tecumseh and Waw-wil-a-way and held many meetings with the Indians with satisfaction and returned home with much peace of mind. Thomas Beals told his friends that he saw with his spiritual eye the seed of Friends scattered all over that good land and that one day there would be the greatest gathering of Friends there of any place in the world and that his faith was strong in the belief that he would live to see Friends settle north of the Ohio River ®51 ®23 ®28 ®99

In 1777, Thomas was again granted a certificate to the Mingo and Delaware Indians on the Ohio River. William Robinson and Isaac Ottoman (interpreter) proceeded as far as Sewickley in the western part of Pennsylvania. In his diary, Samuel Fisher writes: "11th day of 11th month -- Thomas Bails and William Robinson, from New Garden in N. Carolina, visited us... they were on their way to perform a religious visit to the Indians, at the risk of their lives, engaging in this service from a sense of duty and universal love to be kind, engaged our sympathy and desire that they should be preserved in this time of diligence in the arduous undertaking. Thomas Bails expects to spend the greater part of his life among the Indians, and having visited them before, he will be useful among them."

On their return in 1778, they reported that they had been detained prisoners for some weeks in a cold, open barn. Thomas had his certificate taken from him and the group was not allowed to go further.

In 1780, Thomas desiring to move his family to the Ohio River to be near the Delaware Indians, was advised by the meeting that he go himself and make inspection before moving his family. On 25 Mar 1780 Thomas Beals, William Hiatt, Christopher Hiatt and David Ballard were granted certificates to travel to the Ohio River to be near and labor with the Delaware Indians. On 7 Jul 1780, Thomas Branson was granted a certificate to Ohio to be with Thomas Beals. On 30 Sep 1780, Thomas Beals and David Ballard returned the certificates which had been granted them to Ohio. However, at some later date, Thomas Beals with his sons Daniel and John (also Jacob) did move from Grayson Co., Virginia to Quaker Bottom, Ohio, crossing the Ohio River on New Year's day, 1800, where Cincinnati now is. They went to what is now Ross Co., Ohio. Others from the family came later.

According to Roger S. Boone, Some Quaker Families, Thomas Beals was knocked off horse by a tree limb, coffin hewed out of solid butternut tree by Jesse Baldwin. He was buried on the Presley Caldwell Farm about 3/4 mi. west of Richmond Dale (Richmond), Ross Co., Ohio (near Londonderry MH, Highland Co., Ohio). Grave stone in Londonderry FBG.

At 2 P.M on Sunday, September 19, 1937, a public ceremony was held in a little walled plot on the Jacob Caldwell farm near Richmond Dale, Ohio marking the grave of a man who played a big part in the history of Ohio and Ross Co. In this two-rod square burial plot is interred the body of Thomas Beals, the first Quaker or Friends missionary to work among the Indians and early settlers of southern Ohio and Kentucky. Thomas Beals died on August 28, 1801 near the spot of burial and was buried there three days later in a coffin hewed out of a white walnut log. The final resting place of Thomas Beals would be lost forever if it were not for records made by Gershom Perdue. The grave went unpreserved until 1854 when Gershom Perdue, an enthusiastic church organizer among the Friends, prevailed upon the yearly meeting of Friends to take steps to preserve the resting place of their patriarch. On June 20 of the same year the plot was deeded to a special committee of the yearly meeting and the stone wall enclosure built a while later.

According to The History of the Early Settlement of Highland Co., Ohio by Daniel Scott, 1890: "Daniel, John and Jacob Beals, sons of old Thomas Beals, came with their widowed mother, and were the first to communicate the sad intelligence of the death of the venerable and loved Thomas, the preacher, which happened on their way out, and was caused from a hurt received by his horse running under a stooping tree. He died in a few hours afterwards in the woods on the banks of Salt Creek. His sons and others who were with him found it utterly impossible to get plank or any material out of which to make a coffin, so they went to work and cut down a walnut tree and made a trough, which they covered with a slab. Thus prepared, they performed the sad rites, and the remains of the pure and good man were left to repose amidst the profound solitudes of the unbroken forests. The Friends' meeting of Fairfield, in this county, have recently sent down a committee for the purpose of enclosing the grave, which was done by erecting a permanent stone wall around it"

1757 - (Note from JTR: This is probably another Thomas Beals, a cousin sent me this information) Thomas is listed in the "Muster Rolls" of Fredericks Co., MD. According to "The Early Settlements of Fredericks Co., MD". Thomas & Sarah (Ancrum) were still residing in MD 1725 Mar 1765 - Rowan Co., NC, Deed Book 6 p. 258: Thomas Beals to Christopher Hiett - 11 acres - 5 pounds "on the branches of the Horsepenn Creek, beginning at sd. Beals Corner and running south twenty poles to White Oak the West eighty eight poles to a black oak then north twenty poles to a stake on the original line thence to the beginning." signed by Thomas Beals and Sarah Beals and witnessed by Eleazar Hunt and John Unthank (this land was located in that part of Rowan Co. which became Guilford Co. in 1770)

1768 - of Rowan Co. (now Guilford), NC ®98

Westfield, Surry Co., NC (this is the MM where many families who had removed to Tennessee and the west before meetings were established in those areas deposited their certificates -- it is right at border of NC/VA) ®28 ®99

1771-1774 - Thomas, William, Bowater, John and Daniel Beals are on the Surry and Wilkes Co., NC tax list ®73

1775 - travels into Shawnee territory with nephews Bowater Sumner, William Hiatt and David Ballard and became acquainted with Chief Tecumseh and Waw-Wil-a-Way. They are arrested near Clinch Mtn., Virginia for "being confederate with the hostile Indians". Beals felt it right to hold a meeting with the soldiers, after which they were released and they continued across the Ohio River, cross the Ohio River below Pittsburgh, taught many Indians and returned home with peace of mind ®51 ®23

1777 - Religious visit to the Six Nations and some other tribes of Indians by Thomas Beals, William Robinson and Isaac Ottoman (interpreter). They proceed as far as Sewickley, a Friends settlement in the western part of Pennsylvania. They were captured and carried to Hannastown (Fort Reed), not far from Fort Pitt, now Pittsburgh. They were detained some time and then sent home. Still having a concern in his mind for the Indians, Thomas Beals made another attempt to visit them, but was again arrested and imprisoned in a cold, open barn.They were finally released, but not allowed to go further. ®73 ®22 ®23 ®99

1780 - Thomas's request to move his family to Ohio to be near the Delaware Indians is denied by New Garden MM, NC. He was advised to go himself and make inspection before moving family.

1788 - when Thomas' son (John) married, Thomas was described as living in Hawkins Co., TN from Center MM, NC records ®52 (Hawkins Co. est. 1786)

1790 - "Virginia" consists of current states of VA, WV & KY

1790 - Beals, James Horton and a dozen men from NC establish camp on Bluestone River in Kentucky. Horton and 6 men captured. 5 men killed. Horton and John Branson captured and taken to Chillocothe, Ross Co., Ohio and tortured and burned at the stake.

1792 - Thomas and sons John, Daniel and Jacob are received at Westfield MM, Surry Co., North Carolina from Lost Creek, Jefferson Co., Tennessee ®28

Late 1797 - Jesse Baldwin moved 18 miles down the Ohio River from Green Bottom to what was called Quaker Bottom in Lawrence Co., opposite the mouth of the Guyandot River and the present town of Guyandot.

1798 - Thos., Daniel, John & Jacob "laid a concern before the mtg. (Westfield, NC) of removal to Scioto River (Highland Co., OH) or thereaway". Disapproved by QM. ®28

1798 - a group of Friends from North Carolina settle at Salt Creek, near Richmondale, Ross Co., Ohio ®99

1799 - Quaker bottom land (Lawrence Co., Ohio ®44) with John & Daniel ®23 ®28, & Jacob ®51 - just across the Ohio River from the Guyandot River in West Virginia ®44

1799 - Thomas & members of his family moved to Quaker Bottom with Obediah Overman from Grayson Co., VA ®99

1800 - Thomas and John Belas (typo for Beals?) and Daniel and Jacob Beals are on the 1800 census living in Gallipolis, Washington Co., Ohio along with Nathaniel Pope and Jessie Hiatt (all except Thomas Beals are shown in the early records of Fairfield Twp., Highland Co.)

Spring of 1801 - Thomas Beals, Jesse Baldwin and Daniel Beals ®44 (and John and Jacob?) moved from Quaker Bottom, and they, with Enoch Cox and their families, settled on Salt Creek, near the present town of Adelphia ®99